to my shame i think i've only played this once or twice since i got it, thanks to edisonbaggins new Life In Surround video on mucho expensive out of print surround music titles, i thought it was high time i revisited this one and i gotta tell you, straight off the bat this sounds totally unbelievably pick your slack jaw up off the floor drop dead gorgeous!!! 
starting out with the first track makes me wish they had mixed the surround of the whole thing a bit more like Ronald Prent did the Lori Lieberman "Bricks Against The Glass" 5.1 (vocals hard in the Centre with a very in-room dry sound; ay-may-zing! one of my all-time top surround music mixes, its unmissable) but but but.. all is not lost here by any means because the engineer went partly in a different direction to Mr. Prent and sometimes pulled a dry centre channel vocal rabbit out of the hat
and "did a Prent" plonking P.B. in the Centre to absolutely stunning effect.
the mix is very surround-y, with an interesting use of the space (and the channels), its warm and beautiful and open and never anything less than engaging.. it achieves something very unusual in being intimate and yet vast.
taking it channel by channel; you've sometimes heavenly lead vocals in Front L&R, sometimes with faint vocal reverb in C & RL/RR..
other tracks have lead vocals rock solid in the Centre, like the start of trk 4; "Constantinople", trk 6 "Company".. and trk 9, Paul Anka's "She's A Lady" (yes, that "She's a Lady, woah oh woah oh woah"! Tom Jones' song!) in a fabulously sultry, smokey rendition... sounding so delectably yummy you could just eat it/Ms.Barber all up!!!
low bass content's in the LFE, just as it should be.. if it's a song where lead vocals are not in the Centre that channel has some drum parts and occasionally trumpet etc., percussion, cymbal crashes, the distinctive "udu" gets a lot of bongotastic type action everywhere and what sometimes sounded like keyboard accents in the Rear too (though i don't think there are any keys on the album beyond piano? curious..
they might just be guitar parts through some effect pedals or something) the bulk of the rhythm section is upfront along with those divine vocals... speaking of celstial beings, you get heavenly choir swells on closer "Let It Rain".. this is easy QQ "10" territory in my book (thanks for the jolt to replay this one Mike! feels good 
)
starting out with the first track makes me wish they had mixed the surround of the whole thing a bit more like Ronald Prent did the Lori Lieberman "Bricks Against The Glass" 5.1 (vocals hard in the Centre with a very in-room dry sound; ay-may-zing! one of my all-time top surround music mixes, its unmissable) but but but.. all is not lost here by any means because the engineer went partly in a different direction to Mr. Prent and sometimes pulled a dry centre channel vocal rabbit out of the hat
and "did a Prent" plonking P.B. in the Centre to absolutely stunning effect.the mix is very surround-y, with an interesting use of the space (and the channels), its warm and beautiful and open and never anything less than engaging.. it achieves something very unusual in being intimate and yet vast.
taking it channel by channel; you've sometimes heavenly lead vocals in Front L&R, sometimes with faint vocal reverb in C & RL/RR..
other tracks have lead vocals rock solid in the Centre, like the start of trk 4; "Constantinople", trk 6 "Company".. and trk 9, Paul Anka's "She's A Lady" (yes, that "She's a Lady, woah oh woah oh woah"! Tom Jones' song!) in a fabulously sultry, smokey rendition... sounding so delectably yummy you could just eat it/Ms.Barber all up!!!
low bass content's in the LFE, just as it should be.. if it's a song where lead vocals are not in the Centre that channel has some drum parts and occasionally trumpet etc., percussion, cymbal crashes, the distinctive "udu" gets a lot of bongotastic type action everywhere and what sometimes sounded like keyboard accents in the Rear too (though i don't think there are any keys on the album beyond piano? curious..
they might just be guitar parts through some effect pedals or something) the bulk of the rhythm section is upfront along with those divine vocals... speaking of celstial beings, you get heavenly choir swells on closer "Let It Rain".. this is easy QQ "10" territory in my book (thanks for the jolt to replay this one Mike! feels good )
